Tempted by a Warrior
by Amanda Scott
Mass Market Paperback
Published by Forever
List Price: $6.99
Published in 2010
ISBN-10: 0-446-56132-0

Product Description

Lady Fiona, wed in haste, has never known marital peace. When last she’d seen her cruel husband Will, he’d struck her – and she has no memory of what she did next – only that she woke later alone in her bedchamber. Will has gone missing, and Fiona fears that in her rage and terror she might somehow have killed him. When her husband’s cousin Sir Richard comes to search for Will, Fiona is touched by his warm nature. A knight and warrior, Richard is drawn to Fiona’s brave manner, quickly seeing in her an equal measure of inner courage. Confessing that she fears having killed Will, Fiona accepts Richard’s offer to help her. Pursuing together the mystery of Will’s disappearance, they fall in love. Meanwhile the English are reinforcing their garrison in the Scottish Borderlands, putting Fiona, Richard, and Scotland in peril….

About Amanda Scott: (from FantasticFiction.co.uk)

Amanda Scott, best-selling author and winner of the Romance Writers of America’s RITA/Golden Medallion and The Romantic Times’ awards for Best Regency Author and Best Sensual Regency, began writing on a dare from her husband. She has sold every manuscript she has written. More than twenty-five of her books are set in the English Regency period (1810-1820), others are set in fifteenth-century England and sixteenth-and eighteenth-century Scotland. Three are contemporary romances. Amanda lives with her husband and son in northern California.

Giveaway:
Thanks to Anna for letting me host this giveaway.
Contest ends on July 30.
Winners must have a US or Canadian addresses. No PO Box, please.
Please fill in this form, and answer the quesiton below. Winners will be choosen from the comments. I’ll match the addresses from the form.

If you have a chance to ask an author two question, what would it be? Some of your answers will be used in my upcoming author interview (I’ll credit your name for the question)

Tags: Amanda Scott, Hachette Book Group

Some Kind of Sexy (Harlequin Blaze)
by Jamie Sobrato
Mass Market Paperback
List Price: $4.50
Published in 2004
ISBN-10: 0-373-79137-2

I thought I’d try out a new feature on my blog. It’s From-My-Shelves giveaway. Some of the books will be brand new because I have this thing where I end up buying two of the same thing. Some will be slightly used, but still in very good condition.

From the back cover:

Unlike her friends, Juliet Emory will do almost anything to escape the fate of “I do.” There’s just too much fun to be had to tie herself ot one man. Hottie Cole Matheson is a case in point. Sure he’s a little straitlaced for her taste, but his steamy kisses reveal a depth of passion beneath that good-guy exterior. A sexy fling is exactly what this party girl needs!

Cole doesn’t do casual flings…until he meets Juliet, that is. She is so tempting he can’t resist her. With that scorching heat between them, he agrees to do a quick affair –or anything else! — to jeep Juliet in his bed. But all too soon, his feelings are no longer casual. Can he hold out against her sensual tricks and convince her that the best kind of sexy comes after the commitment?

Giveaway:
Open worldwide. No PO Box please.
Leave a comment answering the question below (additional discussion in response to other comments will be extra entries) and fill in this form.

The question is: What is your position on ‘quick flings?’ Are you for it or against it? Is there an exception?

Winner will be randomly chosen on July 1 from the comments left. Winner will received a copy of this book and another ‘surprise’ title.

Author: Michael J. Sullivan
ISBN-13: 9781439184233
Paperback: 244 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 2010

I read mostly romance books, but once in a while, I’ll venture out into something interesting. Necessary Heartbreak is enjoyable. I was mostly reading it while watching my children roll around in the sand pile and jumping on the trampoline. I think this book be a good book for young adults also.

What works for me the flow of the story. Once I start reading, the book keeps me in the story. The time travel aspect is believable enough. Would I read this book again? Probably not, but I will read another book by this author. He’s promising.

Thanks to Sarah for my review copy.

Description from Indiebound

An extraordinary journey back in time shows a struggling single dad that the faith he’s lost is still alive—and stronger than ever. . . .Michael Stewart has weathered his share of hardships: a troubled childhood, the loss of his mother, even the degradation of living on the city streets. Now he’s raising his teenaged daughter, Elizabeth, on his own and doing the best he can at work and at home. But he’s turned his back on his faith—that is, until the morning Michael and Elizabeth volunteer for a food pantry at their local church. While storing boxes in the basement, they step through a mysterious door . . . and find themselves in first-century Jerusalem during the tumultuous last week of Jesus Christ’s life. It is a dangerous and violent place, where doing what your heart tells you is right can get you imprisoned—or worse—and they are thankful to take refuge with a kind widow. But when they come face-to-face with Judas Iscariot and the condemned Christ himself, Michael realizes that before they can escape Jerusalem, he must experience history’s most necessary and shattering heartbreak—and that pain and loss must happen if Michael is to be set free: to live, love, and reclaim the blessings he has in the present day.

Tags: Michael J Sullivan

Searching for Pemberley
by Mary Simonsen
Paperback
496 Pages
Published 2009 by Sourcebooks Landmark

I’ve always wondered myself if one of the greatest love story ever told was based on real people. Mary Simonsen’s Searching for Pemberley is such a book. Maggie Joyce accepted a job in post-World War II London. She stumbles into Montclair, believed to be the inspiration for Jane Austen’s Pemberley.

It seems like Maggie have found the family which inspired the story of Pride and Prejudice. There are journals, letters, and oral history to prove it. What works for me in this book is the three love story that’s cleverly intertwined. There’s the original couple who inspired Jane, then there’s the current descendant, and then there’s Maggie’s love story. There’s Rob, an American pilot, and then there’s Michael, a descendant of the Darcy line.

I get a little glimpse of what is was like for pilots during the war. The narrative rang true. There’s also Beth and Jack’s love story, which I find very fascinating.  It’s is an amazing book.

Tags: Danielle Jackson, Mary Simonsen, Sourcebooks

The Help
by Kathryn Stockett
Hardcover, 464 pages
List Price: $24.95
Published in 2009
Amy Einhorn Books/
Putnam
ISBN-10: 0-399-15534-1

My Take:
This is a wonderful book. It’s not a book I would normally read. I like romance and I like happy endings. This one is different. I was enthralled with Aibileen right away. Her voice is compelling, it makes me want to read more about her. I like Minny, too. She’s spirited and strong. I experienced full range of emotions while reading this book.

This is my first kindle purchase book.

I’m giving away a copy of this book. If you have kindle, then I’ll send you $10 for the kindle ebook. If you do not have a kindle, I’ll send the book to you.

Contest open worldwide. If you win this book and your country sells a copy, I’ll send money via paypal for you to purchase this book. If you have an e-reader (iPhone, etc), then I’ll send you an ebook.

Product Description

Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.

Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

Minny, Aibileen’s best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody’s business, but she can’t mind her tongue, so she’s lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.

Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women—mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends—view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and
hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don’t.

Tags: Kathryn Stockett